


she hangs upon the cheek of night

by ElDiablito_SF



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Bonding, John Silver's People Club, Multi, Sillyness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-28
Updated: 2017-02-28
Packaged: 2018-09-27 10:51:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10015688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElDiablito_SF/pseuds/ElDiablito_SF
Summary: Madi won't let Flint sleep, but he secretly doesn't mind.(Set after 4x05)





	

**Author's Note:**

> me: Oh noes, I can't write while cannon is happening!  
> also me: *can't stop writing in between the episodes*  
> me @ me: LIAR
> 
> I'm a huge dork and so are they! The title is of course a Shakespeare reference b/c #dork. Madi and Flint's friendship is so important to me ಥ‿ಥ

“He talks about you in bed, you know,” she whispered, her breath caressing Flint’s ear as he was just letting his eyelids fall closed for the night. Needless to say, his eyes flew open, fixing upon the star-sprinkled sky above their heads. Up in the trees, the cries of some doubtlessly colorful, exotic bird mocked their shared predicament. Flint’s foot kicked out instinctively, to bank down the remaining glow of the cinders that cast Madi’s dark irises into ambers.

“You mean,” he whispered back, turning his head so that their noses were almost touching, “in his sleep?”

“No.”

Flint swallowed and took a long overdue breath. A few feet away lay the sleeping form of Eleanor Guthrie in a bloodstained green dress. They had been lucky to close out the day among the living, and Flint was too god damn tired to be having this conversation.

“I don’t know what to say,” he confessed, quietly.

“Captain Flint, at a loss for words.” In the starlight, Madi’s smile was just another constellation. Not for the first time, Flint noted that her profile was striking in its regal beauty. Yet, when she looked at him like this, face on, she was a little girl again. A little girl who had lost her father and had left home to make her mother proud. “He doesn’t tell me the things you two do. In private. But he does talk about you.”

“Mmm,” Flint replied, mentally patting himself on the back for even that much of an acknowledgement. There was a chance he may have actually gotten up and left, had she brought up what he and Silver did. In private.

“Does he talk to you about me?” she pressed on.

“Nope.”

She laughed. She had not made a sound but her body shook and her necklaces clicked like a wind chime in the darkness.

“I think it is only fitting then that I should speak to you of him.”

“Revenge?” Flint grinned, feeling the tension ooze slowly out of his body. “Take it from me, if you let it, it will consume you.” He was smiling as he said it, gratified to note her expression mirrored his own. Her little hand moved through the darkness to brush against his cheek, her fingers trailing over the bristles of his beard, giving Flint a moment of strange self-consciousness. He was glad Eleanor had allowed him the small dignities of grooming during his brief and overall rather pleasant imprisonment.

“I did not expect it to be so soft,” Madi whispered, and quickly added, “your beard.” 

He might have said the same thing about her hand. He closed his eyes, willing every braincell not to think about her small, soft hand against Silver’s flesh. Or the way Silver’s long, dexterous fingers would look against her lustrous skin.

“I did not expect many things,” she continued. “You surprised me, Captain.” Her hand slipped down, brushing gently along the hollow of his neck, sending a small army of goosebumps down his arms.

“If you’re worried that I will stand in your way when it comes to your mutual happiness,” Flint finally spoke, finding his tongue and will again, “I assure you, I will not.”

“Do you know what he asked me earlier?” Madi’s body shifted even closer and she propped her head up upon her elbow so that her lips were practically touching Flint’s ear. “He asked me if he would be enough for me, if we were to walk away from all this.”

“What did you say?”

“I didn’t.” She lay back down and turned her face up towards the cloudless skies. “And now that I lie here, I ask myself: would I be enough for him? And what does it mean, this enough? I was happy before your men landed on my island. Before I ever knew him, my life had been enough for me. And now I know him. And I’m beginning to know you. And I see it.”

“What do you see?”

“I see why he is in love with you.”

“And I see why he is love with _you_.”

Her leg shifted and brushed against Flint’s knee. A few paces away, her bodyguards lay snoring in the sand dunes, and Flint caught himself holding his breath again.

“We are friends, are we not, you and I?” she asked.

“Friends are people who wish each other well,” Flint replied, staring into the onyx starlight of her eyes. “I would say we are friends.”

“There was a man who lived in my village sometime back. An old man, marooned many years ago. He’d served on the crew of a merchant vessel from Italy. He told me once that in his country ‘I wish you well’ is just another way to say ‘I love you.’”

Flint swallowed and closed his eyes. _Ti voglio bene._ By no means a linguist, but he had been familiar with the phrase too. 

“Aiii!” she suddenly squealed, shooting up from the sand.

“What’s wrong?” Flint scrambled up, hand grabbing at his sword by habit.

“Something bit me. On my neck. Probably just a bug.”

“Let me see?”

Flint had poked around in the dying embers, stoking them back to life enough to make a small flame which he could hold aloft. She had moved her long hair out of the way, exposing her supple neck to his gaze, and there it was: a small bump on her otherwise unblemished skin. He leaned in closer to better inspect it.

“You’re right. It looks like an insect bite. I don’t think it was anything too poisonous, in case you’re concerned.”

“Not _too_ poisonous,” she laughed. “You don’t need to suck out the venom, Captain?”

By the light of his makeshift torch, Flint observed the teasing laughter hiding just in the corners of her full mouth. She was rather beautiful. Silver was a lucky bastard. His fingers lingered on the curve of her neck, stroking over the inflamed patch of skin.

Madi shifted slightly closer, her eyes fixed upon Flint’s. “How stunning you are,” she whispered. “Such virility, such effortless beauty. You do not know how jealous I have been…”

This would have been by the far the most ridiculous thing Flint had heard that day, and possibly all year, had it not immediately been followed by a far more ridiculous outcry.

“What the _fuck_ do you two think you’re doing?”

“Silver?”

“John?”

Their simultaneous exclamations echoed each other in utter consternation.

“Whatever you think we’re doing, it’s not _that_ ,” Flint quickly added.

“Is it the Spanish? Are we being killed?” Eleanor’s sleepy voice sounded from a nearby sand dune.

“It’s just Silver,” Flint called back.

“Fuck off, Silver…” Judging by Eleanor’s voice, she had already begun to return to whatever dreams were so rudely interrupted.

Flint shifted his torch to illuminate the new arrival’s face, as well as the men standing behind him, looking equally perplexed. Flint nodded at his crewmen, waiting for them to settle down and give the three of them some privacy again. This was turning into an incredibly long and silly night.

“You look… unhappy to see us,” Flint finally said, as the flames flickered up and cast shadows over Silver’s furrowed eyebrows.

“No, but… you…” Silver stammered, pointing from Flint to Madi and back. The long veil of Madi’s hair had fallen back over her neck and shoulders, while her face looked entirely too smug. “You were going to kiss my… And _you_...”

“I wasn’t. We weren’t,” Flint quickly insisted. “Don’t be ridiculous!”

“Which one of us are you more jealous of?” Madi inquired, causing Flint to almost drop the torch.

Before them, Silver strategically shifted his crutch in front of himself, as his eyes shot to and fro between Flint and Madi’s faces. Flint lifted an eyebrow.

“Don’t you two conspire against me,” Silver muttered. “I’m outnumbered. This is… well, this isn’t fair.”

Madi scooted closer to Flint and placed her head upon his shoulder. He had to wonder which one of them looked more terrified at that moment: himself or Silver, who shifted uncomfortably again, exposing the growing bulge in his trousers.

“We’re not doing anything,” Madi purred, her hand resting softly along Flint’s forearm. “You’re working yourself into a state all on your own.”

Flint cleared his throat. “She’s right.”

“Stop agreeing with everything she says. It’s giving me apoplexy.” Silver miserably sank down in front of them.

“You must be tired,” Flint nodded, feeling suddenly fecund with generosity. “Come to bed… Um… sand. Come to sand.” Madi’s laughter tickled the skin of Flint’s neck.

“So I will,” Silver smirked, “but I’m sleeping between the two of you!”

“Yes, that will teach us a lesson,” Madi grinned, making room in between her and Flint.

“It will be such a great _hardship_ ,” Flint added, rolling his eyes, in what he hoped was his most dramatic fashion. His lover… _their_ lover was an idiot.

Silver plopped down onto his back in between them. One of his hands came to brush over Flint’s chest, then lower, until he took Flint’s hand into his and pressed his fingers warmly. Flint imagined Silver’s other hand must have been holding Madi’s on the other side and smiled to himself.

“Goodnight, Captain,” Madi’s voice cooed in the darkness.

“Good night, Madi,” he called back. “I wish you well.”


End file.
